There's the Investarms "Hunter" with the recoil pad that's a good buy. Same barrel(a little shorter) and lock as a Lyman since the Traditional Hawkens and the Hunter Cabelas sells are made by the same company as makes the Lyman Great Plains rifle. Before Cabelas robbed the market of the Traditional Hawken,as they call it, and began to import them without the chrome lined(very rust resistant) bores all the Investarms rifles(Hawkens,Great Plains, Hunter) had chrome lined bores to resist the corrosion of blackpowder. Even the Great Pains had the chrome lined bore. It said right on the box "CHROME LINED BORE". Pedersoli puts the chrome lined bore in some of their rifles. Pedersoli makes the best factory made muzzleloaders in the world when it comes to Traditional Rifles. The new Hawken Pedersoli has out is a real nice gun I think and with the Pedersoli quality it's not as expensive as a Pard may think. Anywhoooo......what I was going to get at is that the Investarms Hunter still comes with the "Chrome lined Bore". Also if a guy wants a rifle that isn't going into the woods for deer then a smaller caliber would be less recoil. The smaller the ball the less recoil. The 45 cal. can take deer at closer ranges and be a nice target rifle too with less recoil than parger bored rifles. Theirs the Traditions Crocket Rifle in 32 cal. that's been touted as very accurate and would be recoil free. If a rifle isn't for deer a Squirrel rifle like the Crocket is a good buy and......a can of powder goes a long way and lead to make the little balls makes it very cheap to fire a lot. Anywhooooo.......before Cabelas got all the "Traditional Hawkens" wrapped up it was easier to get from the importers and I sold a million of them in my little shop. I'd sell them $10 over my cost and shipping and the Amish and the middle class people wanting to deer hunt with a good rifle snapped all I had right up all the time. Never had a defective gun and never had a complaint about accuracy. They shoot real well. Even with conicals but the best with balls. Anywhoooo....one rifle that should get more attention is the TRYON RIFLE made by Pedersoli. Chrome lined bore. Casehardened furniture. Walnut wood. Won International 100 meter Competitions more than once right out of the box. I bet the Pedersoli Hawken that's new,, would do the same. Of course I have an old Investarms Hawken(Cabelas calls it the Traditional Hawken) that can keep up with my Pederesoli Tryon ,I'd say. Those long barreled "Blue Ridge" or as some label them, the "Frontier Rifle" are made by Pedersoli and are dang good guns. People don't realize or know that the Hatfield Rifle is nothing more than the same gun with fancier wood. Anywhoooo......the Traditions rifles are good but the barrels have to be cleaned extra well since the barrels seem to rust easy but like the CVA Hawkens they are tack drivers. Deer Creek Products sells some really nice CVA Hawkens but.....even more interesting are the pre-assembled kits they make. They are put together really well and all that's needed is the wood finished(no shaping with the rasp and all just a little sanding,stain and oil) and the metal browned. You would have yer eyeballs pop out when you opened the box if you bought one of the Deer Creek pre-assembled rifles. They are the best KIT on the market in my opinion. You can finish one up and have it look like a custom rifle that costs hundreds and hundreds more. DEER CREEK Phone 1-765-525-6181. They don't have a web page. The kits they sell are real sleepers and one of the best values out there. Cool too!
I've sold them in the past and never got anything but praise from customers. They have real good wood to metal fit that is really surprising for the money they want for them. The guy at Deer Creek assembles all of the parts to the wood for a customer and the gun can be shot right out of the box if a guy doesn't want to wait to do the finish work. The other kits on the market that need the parts fit to the wood are a nightmare waiting to ruin you. The companies take the defected machine carved wood stocks and throw them in a box and call it a kit. They hardly ever can be fitted right without excess ingenius mechanical aptitude. I mean if the lock inlet is in the wrong position so the hammer can't hit the nipple with a cap on it what can a person do? Move the lock or barrel and leave big gaps in the inletting to fill in and make it look funky? Wood can be taken off but can't be grown back on when it's gone from the wrong place. :banghead: The Lyman and Hawken kits from Investarms are an exception to that. They ain't junked. They can be a little loose in the barrel channals but......when they are glass bedded with Accra-glas Gel they are accurate enough to go right to competition and even win. I've done that for people. Glass bed the barrels and tangs of the Investarms Lyman and Hawken rifles. That isn't actually needed but it don't hurt and makes the guns real tack drivers. Even a rifle with a perfectly inletted barrel channal can benifit from a thin layer of glass bed(wouldn't be able to be differentiated from a coat of varnish it would be so thin). The glass is pushed into the pores of the wood and keeps oil and grease out that may be on the barrels and tags to stop rust. Anywhooooo.......a good fit to the barrel in the channal is a must for accuracy because you hold the wood the barrel is in and if the barrel can twist or move in the woods channal from the centifigal forces the ball puts on the barrel the consistancy of the accuracy falls off. What is cool is that the TC breech plug sold by "Track of the Wolf" lets a guy fit a Green Mountain barrel to a Lyman or Investarms or TC hawkens. There are fast twist conversion barrels breeched and ready to go that Green Mountain makes for TC Hawkens and they fit on the Traditional Hawken Cabelas sells. That gives conical bullet accuracy capability to the rifles. The Lyman Great Plains "Hunter" has the fast twist shallow grooved barrel for conical bullets. Anywhoo..check out "Deer Creek" and have them send a catalog with the colored pics of finished rifles made from the pre-assembled kits they sell.
I've sold them in the past and never got anything but praise from customers. They have real good wood to metal fit that is really surprising for the money they want for them. The guy at Deer Creek assembles all of the parts to the wood for a customer and the gun can be shot right out of the box if a guy doesn't want to wait to do the finish work. The other kits on the market that need the parts fit to the wood are a nightmare waiting to ruin you. The companies take the defected machine carved wood stocks and throw them in a box and call it a kit. They hardly ever can be fitted right without excess ingenius mechanical aptitude. I mean if the lock inlet is in the wrong position so the hammer can't hit the nipple with a cap on it what can a person do? Move the lock or barrel and leave big gaps in the inletting to fill in and make it look funky? Wood can be taken off but can't be grown back on when it's gone from the wrong place. :banghead: The Lyman and Hawken kits from Investarms are an exception to that. They ain't junked. They can be a little loose in the barrel channals but......when they are glass bedded with Accra-glas Gel they are accurate enough to go right to competition and even win. I've done that for people. Glass bed the barrels and tangs of the Investarms Lyman and Hawken rifles. That isn't actually needed but it don't hurt and makes the guns real tack drivers. Even a rifle with a perfectly inletted barrel channal can benifit from a thin layer of glass bed(wouldn't be able to be differentiated from a coat of varnish it would be so thin). The glass is pushed into the pores of the wood and keeps oil and grease out that may be on the barrels and tags to stop rust. Anywhooooo.......a good fit to the barrel in the channal is a must for accuracy because you hold the wood the barrel is in and if the barrel can twist or move in the woods channal from the centifigal forces the ball puts on the barrel the consistancy of the accuracy falls off. What is cool is that the TC breech plug sold by "Track of the Wolf" lets a guy fit a Green Mountain barrel to a Lyman or Investarms or TC hawkens. There are fast twist conversion barrels breeched and ready to go that Green Mountain makes for TC Hawkens and they fit on the Traditional Hawken Cabelas sells. That gives conical bullet accuracy capability to the rifles. The Lyman Great Plains "Hunter" has the fast twist shallow grooved barrel for conical bullets. Anywhoo..check out "Deer Creek" and have them send a catalog with the colored pics of finished rifles made from the pre-assembled kits they sell.
